Family Guys

The fathers I know don’t look anything like the ones we see in the media.

With Father’s Day around the corner, I have a little advice for dads like Arnold Schwarzenegger and Dominique Strauss-Kahn: This year, don’t count on your kids sending you those sentimental cards that say “For a Special Father,” with photographs of fields of gently rolling wheat or ducks coolly coasting on a lake. In fact, be careful when you open your mail.

Whatever happened to Father Knows Best?

The painful reality of Dads Gone Bad is not new, but modern media has only made it worse. On TV, it’s been about 40 years since Father knew best. In recent years TV dads were more likely to be members of the Mafia than they were dentists or sheet metal workers. Duller than Mafia affiliation, perhaps, but at least those jobs were legal. So many TV dads have been portrayed as goons, loons or poltroons, it’s no wonder that more and more women are choosing to raise their kids solo. Often, the names of the programs told you everything you needed to know about the dads they featured. On Arrested Development, the dad used to take his clothes off for a living. On Family Guy, Dad sold his daughter for cash to pay off some debts. And that’s a comedy! Just what kind of Father’s Day card do you get dads like this? I bet even Hallmark would be stumped.

“24’s” Jack Bauer may have seemed like great Dad material – a fearless fighter who was never too busy to plant explosives inside a terrorist’s car, or to take on a whole Al-Qaida training camp armed only with his spare AK-47 and some duct tape. But with this kind of schedule, it was nearly impossible to pin Jack down for parent-teacher conferences. No wonder his daughter ended up in therapy. Or maybe it was the kidnapping by one of the terrorists?

Even media dads who really love their kids were problematic. Homer Simpson did all kinds of goofy things for his kids. He even let himself get impaled by sharp metal objects while pretending to be a robot so his son could win a robot war competition. If only he wouldn’t scratch himself like that in public. Ray Barone (Everyone Loves Raymond) means well, but like so many men on TV, his incompetence and lame jokes compelled his obviously smarter wife to perpetually stand with her hands on her hips looking exasperated. No wonder that guy didn’t have a job.

Reports from Hollywood promise a fall line-up of new shows featuring more committed, sensitive dads. (Man Up!, Up All Night, Last Man Standing) But while these men steer clear of the Mafia or Al-Qaida training camps, most are wussified males prone to bursting into tears. One hires a buff, macho pal to retrain him in the art of masculinity, something he has washed away in the shower under an avalanche of pomegranate body wash. Men on these shows often have time for this since their (smarter, more competent) wives are the ones out in the work force. If Hollywood were remaking “24” for next season, they’d have to write in a scene where Jack (who remarries and has more kids) texts his wife a note that he’s off to Afghanistan for a little while to take down a would-be assassin. None too happy, the wife texts back, “You can’t, Jack. You have carpool!”

Dads have been getting a raw deal on the pages of bedtime stories for kids for years.

It’s no better in kiddie lit, either. Dads have been getting a raw deal on the pages of bedtime stories for kids for years, and my friend Rich has just about had enough. “I don’t get it,” Rich told me while slaving over a full sink of dirty dishes. “Dads like me have been trained to be equal partners in raising our kids. We vacuum, wash dishes, and have to be sensitive at the same time. That’s a lot to ask of a guy, especially when his wife buys him ‘light’ beer. So how come after all this sacrifice, the only kids’ books I can find showing families either don’t have dads at all, or have dysfunctional dads? Even the daddy gorilla in one book I found has a drinking problem and is always sleeping it off in the tree house.” Rich got excited when he discovered one book about an intact family of hippos, but it turned out the daddy was a pachydermal Ray Barone. Not surprisingly, the mom was not only wise, but able to multitask as if she had opposable thumbs.

If Rich doesn’t find some books with good Dad male role models soon, he will have to write his own, which he admits may cut significantly into vacuuming time. It’s a sacrifice he’s willing to make. “Someone has to take a stand for manly, mencshy dads!” Rich avowed, while basting a pot roast for dinner and conjuring up possible story lines.

I know Rich still has lots of company. Most of the dads I know (including my husband) are hard-working menches who know that real men love to build sand castles with their kids, carry them around on their shoulders while singing silly songs, and coach Little League. They can even think up their own sage advice to share with their kids, without cue cards from Mom, and they don’t require pomegranate body wash, either. These men deserve better TV shows, better books to read their kids, and better Father’s Day cards, too. I mean, what is it with those ducks?

So happy Father’s Day to all you wonderful dads, true heroes in our time. And I hope your wives give you the day off from vacuuming.

The opinions expressed in the comment section are the personal views of the commenters. Comments are moderated, so please keep it civil.

Visitor Comments: 3

(3)
MABSH"Y,
June 21, 2011 1:08 PM

Hey! Ray Barone had a very succesful career and devoted family man.

" No wonder that guy didn’t have a job."?? He was a celebrated sports columnist for a newspaper. But unlike the similarly employed Oscar Madison, he stayed together with his wife and family, and while working at home did a fine job of parenting his children, attending all their school activities, parent conferences, even trekking otu to New Jersey to buy his daughter something she really really wanted, etc. Don't sell the guy short!

(2)
miriam,
June 15, 2011 3:46 PM

i think it's payback

I think the abuse heaped on men in our society is payback from women for being treated like objects. A very sick situation in a very sick society.

(1)
Linda,
June 13, 2011 4:31 PM

This is one pet peeve

I absolutely hate what these big mouth women do to our men in this country, If there is a news show where some big mouth woman is showing that attitude of Oh I'm so much smarter then you, you dumb little man, I turn it off. They have done so much damage and emasculated our men, you can only find a good example of manhood in John Wayne movies. My husband is a take charge kind of guy, and demands respect from me, which is only right, and what God expects of me for him. it's not a mans place to slave all day, and come home and do dishes that are piled up in the sink, and cook the meal, while the wife sits on the PC playing computer games, or lounging all day on the phone or TV. When the men in this country stop listening to that "voice of reason" that says they have to comply. they will well be ahead of the game.
I'm all for them helping out if their wife works too, but to do her work and theirs too that's just wrong!!

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I've been striving to get more into spirituality. But it seems that every time I make some progress, I find myself slipping right back to where I started. I'm getting discouraged and feel like a failure. Can you help?

The Aish Rabbi Replies:

Spiritual slumps are a natural part of spiritual growth. There is a cycle that people go through when at times they feel closer to God and at times more distant. In the words of the Kabbalists, it is "two steps forward and one step back." So although you feel you are slipping, know that this is a natural process. The main thing is to look at your overall progress (over months or years) and be able to see how far you've come!

This is actually God's ingenious way of motivating us further. The sages compare this to teaching a baby how to walk. When the parent is holding on, the baby shrieks with delight and is under the illusion that he knows how to walk. Yet suddenly, when the parent lets go, the child panics, wobbles and may even fall.

At such times when we feel spiritually "down," that is often because God is letting go, giving us the great gift of independence. In some ways, these are the times when we can actually grow the most. For if we can move ourselves just a little bit forward, we truly acquire a level of sanctity that is ours forever.

Here is a practical tool to help pull you out of the doldrums. The Sefer HaChinuch speaks about a great principle in spiritual growth: "The external awakens the internal." This means that although we may not experience immediate feelings of closeness to God, eventually, by continuing to conduct ourselves in such a manner, this physical behavior will have an impact on our spiritual selves and will help us succeed. (A similar idea is discussed by psychologists who say: "Smile and you will feel happy.")

That is the power of Torah commandments. Even if we may not feel like giving charity or praying at this particular moment, by having a "mitzvah" obligation to do so, we are in a framework to become inspired. At that point we can infuse that act of charity or prayer with all the meaning and lift it can provide. But if we'd wait until being inspired, we might be waiting a very long time.

May the Almighty bless you with the clarity to see your progress, and may you do so with joy.

In 1940, a boatload 1,600 Jewish immigrants fleeing Hitler's ovens was denied entry into the port of Haifa; the British deported them to the island of Mauritius. At the time, the British had acceded to Arab demands and restricted Jewish immigration into Palestine. The urgent plight of European Jewry generated an "illegal" immigration movement, but the British were vigilant in denying entry. Some ships, such as the Struma, sunk and their hundreds of passengers killed.

If you seize too much, you are left with nothing. If you take less, you may retain it (Rosh Hashanah 4b).

Sometimes our appetites are insatiable; more accurately, we act as though they were insatiable. The Midrash states that a person may never be satisfied. "If he has one hundred, he wants two hundred. If he gets two hundred, he wants four hundred" (Koheles Rabbah 1:34). How often have we seen people whose insatiable desire for material wealth resulted in their losing everything, much like the gambler whose constant urge to win results in total loss.

People's bodies are finite, and their actual needs are limited. The endless pursuit for more wealth than they can use is nothing more than an elusive belief that they can live forever (Psalms 49:10).

The one part of us which is indeed infinite is our neshamah (soul), which, being of Divine origin, can crave and achieve infinity and eternity, and such craving is characteristic of spiritual growth.

How strange that we tend to give the body much more than it can possibly handle, and the neshamah so much less than it needs!